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The Family Festival of Magic 2017
Great Yarmouth
22nd and 23rd August 2017
Reviewed by Steve Majes, Daniel Forde-Pogson and Rick Martyn
This
was the first festival of magic launched in Great Yarmouth and the feedback from
crowds attending was very positive, so positive that a second festival is in
planning for 2018. The setting for this year's festival was in and around St
Georges Theatre in Great Yarmouth. This provided a fantastic area for the
festival as well as the use of the theatre for the late afternoon shows. The
festival started each day at 11am with outside performances from Joshua
Pickering, Jamie Rose, Steve Majes and Daniel Dee, they provided a great
combination of comedy magic, escapology and ventriloquism to draw the crowds.
From this point both days then celebrated the tradition of Punch and Judy, with
hilarious performances from Bryan Baggs and Bryan Clarke. It was great to see
the reactions these two talented performers generated from the children and the
adults, with many audience members staying on for the second show later in the
day. Magic was happening all around with mind reading fun from Oliver Garwood in
the main performing area while Andy The Clown captured the young and young at
heart with his crazy antics on the fringes.
Throughout the two days there were close-up magic performances from Nick
Chapman, Ned Potts, Don Simpson, Robert Rathbone, Graham Bull and Kyle Sarocen
as well as balloon twisting from The Tricky Twister, Nick Twist, Andy The Clown
and Jeffery Drayton from Britain's Got Talent. There was never a dull moment!
Over the two days there were a couple of afternoon shows in the theatre; one
from Don Simpson with his ‘Medicine’ show based on the quack traveling doctors
of the past and a show from The Great Banana. Daniel Forde-Pogson writes: The
Great Banana’s content and delivery was smooth and well-rehearsed, mixing a
combination of mimed comic magic with great audience participation and, for me,
just the right combination of humour and surprises. The magic was really great
from a lovely routine where a cane vanished to a final, all-inclusive, full on
card trick, all nicely banana-themed!
The afternoon's raced past from one performance event to the next and along the
way we had a great vocal performance from songstress Tracy Dean and a surprise
unscheduled visit from Steve Hewlett, yes that’s right, the multitalented
ventriloquist Steve Hewlett popped along and gave an impromptu performance much
to the surprise and delight of the crowd. Steve was headlining at the Britannia
Theatre and had heard about the festival.
Each days afternoon events finished with a stunt at 3pm, on the first day we had
Oliver Garwood, Steve Majes and Joshua Pickering competing in a straight jacket
escape race and on the second day Steve Majes battled to escape from chains and
shackles while secured in a US mail bag before his phone was smashed to
smithereens. These events drew great crowds and were a great lead in to the late
afternoon theatre shows.
At 4pm each day the stage was set and the audiences were seated for the festival
finale. On day one we had Joshua Pickering holding the reins as compere and
introducing Phil Perry to open the show, Phil was much loved by the family
audience and performed a great combination of classic effects finishing on a
fabulous rising card routine. Steve Majes was second with a fun bending mirror
routine that received gasps as it was folded in half, and then he had a very
interactive routine with help from a young volunteer where they made and then
tried to catch a ghost. There was now a short interval and on returning we had
Britain's Got Talent star Jeff Drayton and Chantelle “I don’t want to go in the
cannon!” After a short interview conducted by Steve Majes, Jeff went into his
hilarious routine involving a cannon and his puppet Chantelle where she flew
through the air to find a chosen card, all this was done while Jeff was on
roller skates. Joshua calmed the audience down and introduced the final
Britain’s Got Talent star of the day Stevie Pink. Stevie provided much hilarity
with his psychic routine along with his take on the masked magician, the mask
was of course pink! As well as his comedy skills Stevie also showed his magic
skills with a great multiple cut and restored rope routine to music and
finishing on a stage filling dancing handkerchief routine all delivered with
that pink flare.
On day two we had compere and performer Paul Henri open the show with his
ventriloquist act involving George T Monkey, Paul’s experience shines though as
all at once he had the young and old in stitches at George’s antics. Paul then
introduced Stevie Pink who was returning for a slightly abridged second
performance, again Stevie had the audience under his pink spell and was a
fabulous finish to the first half. After the interval Chris North took to the
stage with gusto and presented a fantastic family magic show full of visual
effects and audience participation. Rick Martyn writes: Chris took to the stage
and instantly the audience warmed to his easygoing manner. His routines were
polished, professional and spot on. Equally at home working with the adults or
the children, Chris performed strong magic in a style that seems to have been
lost by a lot of performers today. I believe it was the late Ken Brooke that
said, “magic is as much about the journey as it is the destination...” Well, the
journeys that Chris took us on last night were very enjoyable indeed. I am
already looking forward to watching the show again next year!
Chris really brought the first Family Festival of Magic to a great close with
many happy faces leaving the theatre and remarks that they would definitely come
back to the festival next year. A big thank you goes out to all the members of
both ‘The Gathering’ and ‘The Anglian Magic Society’ that took part in the
performances and back stage work and to Tony Hawkins who was paramount in the
publicity and stewarding side of the event. And lastly both societies would like
to express their great thanks to Kyle Sarocen and Stephen Bolam for creating,
organising and running such a fantastic event that will benefit both societies
and many local magicians.
© Steve Majes, Daniel Forde-Pogson and Rick Martyn, September 2017.